Vefja
by purebloodragdoll
Summary: She's stunning, poised, fearless, and always wrapped in stylish, one-of-a-kind gowns. But her well-plotted future - filled with husband, home, and high society - is about to be unraveled...and she couldn't be more pleased. AU. Set in 1815 Norway with a touch of 1815 English tradition. OOC!
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:** First Hiccstrid story! Astrid, Hiccup and the rest of the characters will be quite the OOC, I hope you don't mind. I have to twist their characters in accordance to the timeline and the plot I have in my. Though, debuts and such are only for popular around England and such, please work with me.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own HTTYD. All rights reserved to Jennifer Bradbury.

* * *

><p><strong> Vefja <strong>

**Chapter 1**

**00000000000000000000000000000000000**

_**Berk, Norway**_

_**1815**_

"Put the book down, darling," my mother said from her chair beside the mirror.

"The chapter's end is only a short way off," I replied, reaching out with my other hand to flip the page. Despite the ache in my shoulder from holding the book at arm's length so the dressmakers could work on my gown, I didn't want to give up.

"For Thor's sake, you've read it a dozen times," Mother said, rising to snatch the book from my hand. I half lunged for it, an action answered by the jabs of a dozen pins in places sensitive enough to ensure the book was lost to me for now.

"It improves each time," I told her, letting my arms fall, the sensation of the blood rushing back into my finger too brief the dressmaker nudged on elbow upward again.

"Please, miss," the woman said, gesturing at the bodice, managing to sound even more exasperated with me than Mother had.

I lifted my arms again, posing as if I were about to take flight. According to some, I was—my debut had come, bringing with it Mother's long-awaited opportunity to parade me about in front of all of Berk. The dress wrapped itself around me in tucks and folds of silk the color of sky as it stands on the top of a cup of tea, waiting to be stirred in. The trim in the neckline was exquisitely wrought in lace Mother had warn me more than once not to tell Father the price of. I'd pleaded unsuccessfully to have this particular dress made from shimmering red my brother had sent home from India. However, Mother was firm that red was perfectly unsuitable.

She was right, of course, as she was about most everything. She was right that this color was far more appropriate for a girl making a debut that it would allow me to fit and stand out at the same time. I wasn't sure I was ready to do either yet. And I was relatively certain I wasn't prepared to step into society as Mother's protégé. I adored my mother, but I didn't want to be her. Not yet, anyway.

"You really might at least pretend to be more diverted by all of this," she complained, turning down a corner of the page of my book before placing it on the dressing table. I frowned as soon as I saw this. My mother just made a crease on my book! I fought the urge to beg her to use the scrap of lace I'd employed s a bookmark. I didn't want any creases in that particular copy of _Mansfield Park_. But the damage was done. And Mother was incensed enough with me already.

"On the contrary, Mother," I said, balancing on my left foot just long enough to scratch the back of my right knee with my toe, "I find the prospect of this evening's entertainment so overwhelming that it helps to have something to occupy my mind."

Mother almost smiled. "It does promise to be an affair. I'm sure I've waited long enough before agreeing to be seen at one of these events, don't you think?"

"Never be the first or the last to adopt fashion," I said, echoing her word dutifully.

"But you _must_ be the first to make an impression on our host this evening," she said, a smile beginning at the corner of her mouth. Mother had decline two earlier invitations for parties of this sort. But when this one from Lord Snotlout Jorgenson came so fortuitously time with my debut, Mother accepted with haste. I couldn't blame her exactly. Lord Jorgenson was exactly the kind of man she or any other eager mother wanted for her daughter. He might have been the most sought after man in all of Auðigr Park, if not all of Berk. He was charming, handsome, and rich.

For them, anyway. I couldn't care less.

I rolled my eyes, whispered, _"È una verità universalmente riconosciuta, che uno scapolo in possesso di un'ampia fortuna debba avere bisogno di una moglie."_

"Don't mumble, dear," she ordered.

This time I slipped from Italian to Russian and spoke a bit louder. _"Это правда общепризнанным, что один человек при себе удачу, должны быть в неимением жены."_ I loved the way Russian insisted on tickling the back of my throat.

"Astrid." Mother's tone carried the warning for her.

I translated the line again, this time to German, so Mother might recognize it at last. _"Es ist eine allgemein anerkannte Wahrheit, dass ein Junggeselle im Besitz eines schönen Vermögens nichts dringender braucht als eine Frau."_

She stiffened, crossed her arms. "You know how it vexes me when you show off—what man will stand for that, I wonder?"

Finally, I all but shouted at her in French. _"C'est une vérité universellement reconnue, qu'un seul homme en possession d'une bonne fortune, doit être dans le besoin d'une femme."_

She took a moment, narrowing her eyes in tiny slits. "It's not enough that you must cavort in tongues that no respectable girl has any business speaking, but you must quote those books in the bargain? Honestly, Astrid."

I smiled sardonically. "I was agreeing with you," I said, "or at the very least A Lady was." I looked down at the younger of the two dressmakers. "It's from _Pride_ _and Prejudice_," I said. " 'It is a truth universally acknowledged, that a single man in possession of a good fortune, must be in want of a wife.' Have you read it?"

The girls eyes lit up and she began to nod, but Mother cut short her reply. "Of course she's read it. Half of Norway has read it, which is why it's vulgar to quote it."

"Half the world has read the Bible and people quote it all the time." I shrugged.

"I'll pretend you didn't just compare the scribbling of a female novelist to the words of the Christian's Lord," She said. "Whatever will I do with you?

I sighed. "Marry me off to a rich man before he sees how clever I am. And with me in this gown at this evening's most romantic of events, it appears your task is half done already."

Mother sat again, placated a bit by my apparent acquiescence to her plan. "The entertainment he has chosen is gruesome, but it will provide a stunning foil for your beauty."

Wed agreed that we would both politely decline actively participating this evening if pressed to do so. But Mother would not risk staying clear of the party outright. She was sure that Jorgenson was finally ready to seek a wife after several years in Berk society and that if I weren't there to be seen as a candidate, my chance would be lost.

And how much I would love that to happen; if only I can channel my way out of this event, this society I'm living in. I didn't have the stomach to tell her that I wanted to stay here in my room reread an A Lady novel or continue practicing my secret training of swords and axes.

Lady Thorston told me they do this sort of thing all the time in England. But so many of the fancies out of Europe have to be weighed against good English judgment and civility, I always say," my Mother mused.

"They trim their gowns in red lace in London, ma'am," one of the seamstress offered. Mother had brought the dressmakers here in our manor in order to preserve the secrecy of my gown. She couldn't bear the thought of my first debut gown being copied or seen by anyone before I'd had a chance to wear it. Her paranoia knew no bounds on this score. Already she'd been favoring the shop far from Djarfr Street and the prying eyes of her friends and neighbors. But bringing the dressmakers to our home was extreme even for her. She'd always arranged to do the same with the final fittings for my presentation gown, but the dress was still being pieced at the shop.

Mother jabbed a finger at the girl, "How dreadful. Just because the English do it doesn't mean we should. Norway is her own sovereign sensible state.

"And we may stay that way for eternity. Thor save the King and damn Dagur!" I said.

Mother's gaze darkened. The two dressmakers pretended to be fascinated with the pleats. "Take care to find a way to voice out your patriotism more appropriately," my mother warned.

"Yes, Mother." I sighed. But I felt the same about the mad little man across the channel as anyone in Norway. Dagur the Deranged had more lives than cat, had been the villain of the newspapers and in our household since I was a child. Before I even properly understood that he aimed for nothing less than ruling the world—and Norway with it—I used to spy on my brothers as they staged reenactments of the Battle of Berserker in the nursery.

Ten years Dagur had haunted us. And with his most recent return from exile, the threat gained strength anew. It was enough to make me wonder if debuting under such a shadow was sensible. I'd tried once to persuade Mother on this point. Her reply has been swift and certain: The very best affront we could offer the Swedish would be to continue on with our lives as if Dagur and his ambitions worried us not at all. Solid Viking tradition scoffing in the face of danger. She'd sounded as though she belonged on the floor of the House of Lords at Father's side.

Mother seemed to read my thoughts. "It is so important that you debute now, Astrid," she affirmed. "It is your duty. Our duty. To Asmund and his compatriots, that they may know we have confidence enough in them to protect us. To those of the lower classes who need to see their betters continuing with the important traditions and rites that makes ours a great nation…and to flout Dagur, the little cockroach!"

I rolled my eyes. "I can hardly see how my debut will cause old Dagur the Deranged to flinch, Mother."

She sat up straighter, her chin lifting. "Principle, Astrid," she said gravely. "It's the principle of the matter."

"To say nothing of _your_ principles," I teased. Mother had waited longer that she wished for my debut season to arrive. Her own season had resulted in a triumphant match with my father. I suppose I couldn't hold it against her that she was eager for me to find such happiness.

Mother hesitated, softened a bit, and then spoke. "Well, I have been very patient, haven't I?"

"Mother, I'm barely seventeen!" I said, falling as easily into the argument we'd been having for the last two years as I might into my own bed.

"_I_ debuted at sixteen," she replied, on script. "And married your father at seventeen. Of course custom dictates a longer engagement these days. Though I think any longer than two years is a bit absurd…"

Mother suddenly sprang to her feet and worked her way in between the two dressmakers. "This pleat does not lie properly. It will not do."

"You're not eager to marry Asmund or Audun off," I complained.

"Asmund is years from being a suitable husband and Audun…" She paused, she shook her head. "Even your father's fortune, I do not know that he will have the same sense to marry so well."

"No one could marry as well as Father," I said sweetly, even meaning it.

Mother smiled, swatted at my hand. "You're a good girl, Astrid," she said. "And you'll make an excellent wife. Though I shudder to think what kind of home you'll keep." She nodded to the wallpaper. "I still can't account for those."

I smiled at the blue walls, flecked with shimmering sunrays and clouds and a beautiful blue with yellow spike dragon peeking through the clouds. I'd begged Father to bring me something special when he'd gone as part of a delegation to Denmark when I was nine or so. He'd brought the paper, telling Mother that the Queen herself had it hanging on the walls of the throne room and that it was perfect for his dear princess.

The dull cloud that had been on my wall since my grandmother's time gave away.

"I'm sure you'll be at hand to advise me," I said quietly, looking about the room at the other objects that Father had brought me home during his years of travel, or that Asmund had sent from various ports while at sea. The pointy little slippers from Turkey, the delicate toy drum from the Indies and the dozens of books in various languages, some of which I'd managed to read, others still waiting to be unlocked.

Mother looked at me. "Lord Jorgenson's tastes do run quite the same direction as yours."

It was true. I'd been to Jorgenson's twice before, and the house was chockablock with curiosities, the bulk of which had been ferried over from Egypt. Nothing went together. Strolling through his sitting room was like rummaging through the world's attic, so varied and odd was the collection of items he possessed and displayed. He even had a small golden idol shaped like a bird on his mantelpiece.

"Perhaps you'll even be so kind as to decorate our entire house so that I might have time to concentrate on my studies?"

Mother shook her head. "Education is for children. And you've already had far more than your share. I let your father keep finding those language tutors for your and weapon trainers, though I really doubt a girl should need it. But there comes a time when every girl must step out of the schoolroom and into the life that awaits her." She held my eye. "And that time for you is come at last!"

At this, the seamstress stepped away and looked to Mother. She circled around me, studying very stitch and hem and pleat and ruffled and fall of fabric.

"Very good," she said finally.

I looked at myself in the mirror. Still a girl in a lovely dress, my golden blonde hair pinned back, waiting for Clarisse to do with it what only she could.

But what that girl in the mirror felt surprised me, I'd spent months arguing with Mother about allowing me to continue my studies, pleading Father to convince her to delay my debut, and yet, in this dress…

I looked beautiful.

How odd a sensation. Mother was beautiful. I was not. And yet in the dress I looked like a girl ready to make her debut, a girl who belonged at a party, or a coronation, or something important. And then an even odder shiver ran through me: I wanted to see what could happen at parties and dinners for a girl dress like I was. At least it would be something new, possibly exciting, even if it was a quick step into the rest of my life.

Suddenly all of me couldn't wait to wear this dress tonight.

Mother must have noticed the change.

"You wear it well," she said.

And for once I could not argue.

* * *

><p><strong>AN:** I'm not going on about the whole history and stuff 'cause around 1815, Norway is allied with Denmark and was force to join Napoleon and such and around this time is the treaty with Sweden so, just work with me. Reviews?


	2. Chapter 2

**Author's Note:** Oh, thank you for the first 10 people who reviewed! I hope you tuned it for more and please keep reading. Thank you so much.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own HTTYD.

* * *

><p><strong>Vefja<strong>

**Chapter 2**

That night we found ourselves in a corner of Lord Jorgenson's gardens, four houses east of our own residence. Summer cottons and silks billowed on the warm breeze as a few dozen guests glided across a lawn so perfectly trimmed I was almost sorry to walk on it. Nervous whispers rippled through the crowd around me as we followed our host through the crowd me as we followed our host through an ivy-covered archway and onto a broad stone patio. A hedge of oily torches spat plumes of smoke, beckoning us closer to the object we'd all been invited to see. Amid the ring of firelight sat a table draped in scarlet velvet.

A mummy lay upon it.

Lord Jorgenson, resplendent in a waistcoat of blue the color of the night sky above us, opened his arms as we crowded onto the pavers. It was clear he could sense the same unease and curiosity that ran through us all, though he seemed to relish it, letting the silence build as he surveyed our faces.

His eyes landed on me, seemed to hold there a bit longer and I was reminded of how Mother and half of the women of the Park described him.

_Magnetic._

Jorgenson could hold an entire room as he gaze at once but still makes each person feel as if he or she were its most important occupant. Mother explained it was a gift, the talent of a natural-born host and leader, the type of man who inspired loyalty and ardor in equal measure.

But I was a girl in a beautiful dress, a girl capable enough of giving back as good as she got. I nodded, smiled demurely and held his stare.

His eyes never strayed from mine as he smiled mysteriously, then asked, "Who will be the first to dare upset our Egyptian guest on his journey through the underworld?" He looked at each of us, even though I was quite sure he'd determined who'd be first even before sending out the invitations. But I wasn't expecting what he said next.

"Astrid Hofferson! _You_ must take the first pass," Jorgenson boomed, beckoning me forward.

"Me?" I asked in alarm. Whispers rippled through the crowd. My boldness of a moment before retreated as I flushed. Jorgenson was showing me some preference.

"Of course," he said. "In honor of your pending debut, Miss Hofferson."

I waited for Mother to intervene, to tell Jorgenson that I couldn't possibly—we'd _agreed_—but the expression she wore when I glanced her way told me I was on my own. Had Jorgenson's choice out weighted all her opinions about how lurid this affair was? Was the whim of a would-be suitor already overriding her _principles_? Finding no help in Mother, I looked back to Jorgenson. He was waiting, his stare so loaded with expectation that I found myself taken aback again. Was I imagining that there was an invitation to more lurking beneath that sly grin?

Finally I found my voice, "Your kindness is most generous, but I could not presume—"

"I insist," he said. Taking my elbow and steering me to the foot of the mummy. I could imagine the eyebrows rising behind me and felt my throat tighten. I expected Mother was by now beaming triumphantly, scheming about how best to announce an engagement that apparently she'd been plotting for months.

I was not the only girl at the party who was meant to enjoy her first season this summer. I knew Ruffnut Thorston was supposed to be here. Dr. Hoark, the physician to half of the residents brought his daughters. There was another girl, the niece of one of the new families at the south end of the Park, here as well. We were all in new gowns, all novices at social events like this, all fresh from schoolrooms or tutors.

But Jorgenson singled me out.

"Just there, Miss Hofferson," he said, his breath warm on my shoulder.

"Lord Jorgenson—"

"Just take the blade here"—he slipped a small silver knife under a band of the linen—"and slide upward. Then your peel the wrappings back a layer at a time."

"Sir." I began to protest, but he'd already disappeared back into the crowd of his guests to fetch others to join me for the entertainment.

"_But there's a person in there,"_ I thought, trying not to wince. Don't get me wrong, I do not have a problem with slicing or ripping other things but to do it on the remains of someone? Someone who'd been folded carefully up inside those layers of fabric, someone who hadn't meant to be seen again at all.

Someone who hadn't expected to be put on display, ogled by curious eyes.

Someone a little like me.

As oddly flattering and unnerving as it felt to have caught the eye of Jorgenson, here was one feeling I was certain I would never enjoy: the sensation of all these eyes staring at me, appraising me, sizing up what my future was meant to be.

I sought Father's face in the crowd, and found him eyeing me from the periphery, an unreadable smile on his lips. The one that walked so fine a line between mockery and contentment.

"Don't look so frightened, Astrid," my brother Audun whispered as he joined me at the body, proud to be among those chosen to cut first, "It's just some old bones and linen."

"I'm not scared of the mummy." I returned.

"You and your nonsense talk about women being the equal of men." My oldest brother shook his head. He reached for his own knife and a handful of the linen.

"Lord Jorgenson didn't say we could begin," I pointed out, though etiquette concerning affairs of this sort was a bit muddled. Even Mother had been unsure of the protocol.

"Didn't say we couldn't. Trust me, Astrid. Fellow from down at the club—" he paused briefly to saw through a bit of the linen—"he told me all about these things. He's got an uncle worth sixty thousand a year who's already hosted one unwrapping. He said you just grab a knife and start digging away. There's all sort of little things the old natives used to wrap up in the cloths—trinkets mostly, items they reasoned the body would need in the next world."

"I'm familiar with the purposes of mummification." I said.

"But the good bit," Audun continued, ignoring my jab as he hacked away, "is sometimes they would hide some valuable items. And not just old things that are valuable because some museum might want them. Jewels and precious stones and so forth."

"It just doesn't seem right somehow," I said. "disregarding the last wished of a human being."

He shrugged. "Just a body, Astrid. Don't let your imagination get the better of you. Though I fear those novels you are so fond of have made you afraid of the real world."

I felt unwise to point out that a horde of Berk's wealthiest and most fashionable citizens preparing to pillage a centuries-old Egyptian mummy like a Christmas pudding was perhaps as far from the real world as I could imagine.

But for Audun, past twenty but no more sense than he had at fourteen, this was real.

Our host placed the third and the final guest at the body, Lady Ack. Jorgenson stared at us gravely, but the volume of his voice carried out to the thirty or so other faces watching eagerly in the firelight. "Begin! But beware awakening the mummy and rousing the curse!" He managed to keep his stony expression for a few seconds before he collapsed into a giggle, and motioned to the sitar player who had followed us outside from the dining room to offer some musical accompaniment to our macabre task.

What a sitar had to do with Egypt, I couldn't tell, except that Jorgenson and many of his guests seemed content to lump all thing exotics and foreign into one tidy category.

I realized sadly that this might be the closest I ever came to glimpsing the wonders of the world beyond Norway. How I longed to board a frigate to Egypt—or anywhere, for that matter—wander through a bazaar, ride a camel to the pyramids and the Valley of the Kings with a veiled pulled across my face. I'd rather hear street musicians plink away at odd instruments than listen to a sitar player and a string quartet fail to reproduce mystery of North Africa. I looked at the mummy then for what it truly was—an emissary from the world I would likely never know or taste or feel—and it nearly broke my heart.

Audun had already dug a swath few inches wide, revealing only more wrappings. Lady Ack swallowed hard and picked her own knife, delicately sliding it under an edge. I steeled myself to my task, reasoning that sooner I began, the sooner I'd be excused. But my eye fell on a living person as out of place here as the mummy. A young man, probably around my age, sat on a stool just outside the firelight. He suddenly rose to his feet, balancing a great ledge book across one arm, a grease pencil in his other hand.

He was no guest. His coat was too shabby and his shoes too low at the heel to merit an invitation. But his height, his intent emerald green eyes, and the square shape of his jaw more than made up for an indignity in his dress. He rivaled even my imagined picture of Mr. Darcy. I forced my eyes away, afraid of being caught staring by the mysterious young man or anyone else.

"Astrid," came Lord Jorgenson's voice at my ear. "Others are waiting. You must take your pass and find what you will."

I understood why it mattered to him that I enjoy this; that others see my enjoying it. He'd made it perfectly clear when he called me out first.

But I didn't understand why I felt both flattered and annoyed at the same time. Dare I say it, annoyance weight more than the other?

I picked up my own small, sharp knife, but still I hesitated. I studied the bundle that sat before me, wondering if it was a trick of the torchlight that made the wrappings where I stood seems a little bit lighter in color. I was about to ask Jorgenson if he noticed it as well, when he spoke again.

"Please, Miss Hofferson," he said. "If you're uncomfortable—"

"I'm not," I said quickly. But now I was irritated and wanted only to get this over with.

"What is that young man doing?" I asked him as I felt the first bit of linen give away under the knife. The stranger I noticed at earlier hovered near the head of the body now, furiously jotting notes into his ledger as Audun and Lady Ack hacked away.

Jorgenson followed my gaze. "He's someone from the museum. They like to catalog the bodies, describe the remains and the condition of the wrappings. Claim it helps to document every specimen, even ones for private parties. I don't even know this fellow's name, but Gunnar at the museum sent him over."

"Hmm," I said, cutting through more of the layers, the dust of the linen making my fingers slippery.

"Don't worry, my dear, he can't take any of the things we find. I paid for this mummy—and half the ones in that museum. So what's here is ours to keep. Certainly if something is precious enough we might choose to donate it to the collection, but it is my greatest wish that you'll return home with a lovely memento of this auspicious evening."

"Aha!" my brother cried, chest thrust out, golden hair falling into his eyes as he extracted a small ankh from the furrow of linen he'd plowed. The trinket was lovely, burnished gold crested with a dark green stone. My brother, however, seemed to think that he was the one worth admiring. Audun held the ankh above his head for the crowd to see, grinning as if he'd just rescued it from a pit of hissing asps.

As the guest surged forward to inspect his prized, I continued in my course, determined to find something and have done with my part in desecrating the grave of a fellow human—be it male, female, pharaoh or merchant.

Blessedly, we were still nowhere near the actual remains. But the pile of linen already unwound from the body seemed impossibly large, spilling of my narrow end of the table, coiling about my feet, as if I were the next in line to be immobilized and preserved for all eternity. I glanced at Jorgenson. Perhaps I was.

"A fine discovery," Lord Jorgenson said to my brother, holding the ankh up to catch the torchlight. If Jorgenson had a natural gift of commanding an audience, he was equally adept at keeping one enthralled. He appeared to enjoy this role immensely, particularly when he could pontificate on a subject he knew as well as Egypt. "The cut and color of the stone are consistent artifacts form a certain Theban dynasty."

Then a metal edge emerged from the cloth in front of me, like a scallop shell half buried in the sand. My pulse raced as the undeniable excitement of the moment took hold. I glanced up to see if anyone else had seen it yet, but they were all still attending carefully to Jorgenson's impromptu lecture about Audun's ankh. So no one noticed I pulled the item from the wrapping. No one but me saw the object breath fresh air for the first time in a thousand years. The feeling was unexpectedly thrilling, and I could only imagine what it might feel like to unearth whole temples forgotten to time, like that Swiss man had found at Abu Simbel a couple of years ago.

I started to call to the others, but they were listening raptly as our host delivered a detailed description of a small scroll found by Lady Ack at the shoulder of the corpse.

I left them to Jorgenson's performance and studied the treasure I'd unwrapped. It was intricately carved outline, shaped like a dog's head, made of what appeared to be iron owing to the rust flaking from the corners. It fit perfectly in the palm of my hand, the snout tipping out at the first knuckle of my ring finger, its ears extending to the base of my thumb. The detail along the edges was extraordinarily precise, each tooth in the parted muzzle sharp, the ruff at the back of the neck bristling. A small scrap of linen clung to the rim, secured with a knot too tight for me to work out easily. The characters printed upon the linen there were even more impenetrable. A different sort of hieroglyph, I reasoned, but just as reasonable as those on Lady Ack's scroll.

Jorgenson was concluding his lecture, and I knew my discovery and I would be next to be on display. I stared at the sad little dog's head.

And I felt pity for it in a way that surprised me. Pity that it had been plucked from its own quiet life inside the wrappings, would now be a subject to scrutiny, have its value and utility assessed.

It wasn't fair. Any of it.

I checked the crowd again, especially the young scribe from the museum. He was frantically jotting notes, straining to get a closer glimpse of the ankh.

Jorgenson had said we could keep what we found, hadn't he?

And hadn't our friends and neighbors seen enough of Jorgenson standing over me this evening to keep tongues wagging and minds whirling for weeks?

And hadn't I had as much attention as I could endure for one evening?

Yes, yes, and yes.

Satisfied, I closed my palm around the trinket and tucked in into the bodice of my dress.

* * *

><p><strong>AN:** Aha, was that Hiccup, Astrid eyeing in the party? Anyway, I'm off…I'll update soon, I promise…Will watch that not so scary new movie Ouija. Seriously, what is wrong with me? I don't get scared by ghost/demon movies, stories and such but I'm scared bloody murder by a mere syringe? (Is there such thing as syringe phobia?) Reviews!


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note:** To Teiresias: Oh, I didn't mean Thebes in Greece, what I meant was the sixteenth dynasty of ancient Egypt.

**Disclaimer:** Don't own anything.

* * *

><p><strong>Vefja<strong>

**Chapter 3**

I'd only ever stolen biscuits from the kitchen at home, so I was surprised that I felt as cool in that moment as the bit of ironwork hiding in my dress. And it was this realization that thrilled me even more than the act itself. To stand amid a throng of people and have a secret. To have done something just beneath their very nosed was simply the most delicious feeling. Not that I had the strictest sense actually stolen it. If I was guilty of any theft, it was merely that I robbed the other partygoers a glimpse of the little object.

I slipped neared the knot of admirers poring over the scroll. Lord Jorgenson, brow furrowed, announced, "No, the hieroglyphs are unfamiliar."

"Has the Crown made any process in that area?" Lady Gothi, the oldest and most respectable member of the Park's grand society, asked gravely. Norway had recovered the Rosetta stone from Dagur's troops after his defeat at the Nile some ten years ago. I'd seen it at the museum and knew like the rest of the world that it represented the best hope for eventually unlocking the hieroglyphics adorning the many artifacts now populating Norway, that it might hold the keys to unlock the secrets of ancient Egypt.

"No, my Lady, but my people at the museum assure me we are making progress."

Lord Jorgenson was a avid collector of experts as he was of Egyptian antiquities. He'd brought dozens of scientist and historians to Norway from the Continent and Egypt, several of whom were installed as employees at the Norway Museum.

Jorgenson himself had only been living in Berk for the last five or six years. Mother said he'd inherited his title and stunning manor somewhere near Oslo but hadn't lived there, taking degrees from Norway U and then spending a few years on the other parts of the continent, where he'd increased an already sizable fortune by buying shares in a shipping company. But then he moved to Berk to indulge his passion for Egyptology, to be at the heart of the world's greatest collection of artifacts, and to oversee developments and steward and considerable funds he's endowed the museum with.

Jorgenson's valet—a man I knew only as Gustav—suddenly broke through the crowd in great agitation and whispered in his master's ear. I could not hear what was said, but I could see Jorgenson's face transform from contented self-importance to something altogether grim.

"When?" he barked, glaring at the valet in a rare display of temper. I blanched, half-worried that my theft has been seen and that I was about to be exposed…

"Just received the message, sir," said the valet, his voice rising to match Jorgenson's. The light caught the rest of his face, revealing the oddity made him see at home among Jorgenson's collection of curious objects. One of his eyes had a misshapen pupil, the black dot spilling out into the gray-brown iris like the cracked yolk of an egg.

"I beg your pardon," said Jorgenson, pushing his way free of his guests. "I've urgent business to attend to. I'm sure Mrs. Blalock and the Hofferson family will continue events in my absence." He left without another word, striding hurriedly back to the house, Gustav scurrying behind.

My brother immediately took charge. "Right, then. Who's next? Astrid obviously hasn't the nerve for all this. Who will take her place?" I gladly surrendered my knife, slipping away as Audun installed three new treasure seekers.

I felt a hand on my arm. "You can't think I didn't notice that!"

Ruffnut Thorston stared at me, her eyes imploring. We'd been friends since we were small, having reside three doors down from each other for much of our lives. Ruffnut's family usually summered in the Lakes, and even took me with them one year and we'd shared tutors in music and painting

"Notice what?" I asked her, my cheeks growing hot. My hand flew instinctively to the bodice of my dress as if to make sure the dog's head wasn't peeking out. At the last moment, I have let my fingers rest on the jade pendant I had insisted my Mother allow me to wear this evening. It was another of the baubles Father had brought me from his travels. This one came from China, the sea green stone shaped into a delicate little butterfly. I'd worn it faithfully since he presented it to me on my eleventh birthday. I rubbed the wing as if it were a talisman.

"Don't play coy, Astrid Hofferson, everyone saw it!"

Suddenly my palms and forehead felt damp. The small iron dog's head in my dress seemed to burn against my skin.

"I don't—I cast about desperately for a lie—"know what you mean."

"Truly? You didn't notice that Jorgenson as good as declared himself right there?"

I breathed, smiling with relief. But Ruffnut misinterpreted the reason.

"I expect you'd be please. He's only the man half of Berk's matchmakers are gunning for this season. And he fancies _you!"_ she said, her own smiled just a little too perfect, the slightest hint of bitterness in her voice. Ruffnut was my friend, but I was reminded of the painful truth: During our debut, others would pit us as rivals for the affections of Berk's wealthiest and most weddable men.

Oh, how I miss the times we would roll in the mud with her twin brother, Tuffnut.

"I don't know that I'd say that," I protested.

"Of course you wouldn't, but you don't have to," she said, adding. "_He_ did. And he's so young—"

"He's twenty six, Ruffnut, near ten years older than the both of us."

"I'll be fortunate to land one only twenty years my senior. And not half so handsome in the bargain."

Handsome? Jorgenson was bulky and quite short, though no hint of belly beneath his waistcoat. He had all his hair, and everyone spoke highly of his grey eyes and fine teeth and easy smile.

But did I find him handsome?

He wasn't awful. But he certainly wasn't a Mr. Darcy. There was nothing brooding or mysterious about Jorgenson. Still, perhaps a Darcy in fiction was better than one in reality; because life with such a man as that could be hard, despite its pleasures. Then again, earlier this evening, that young man from the museum, didn't he remind me of Mr. Darcy? Maybe Mother and Audun were right: Jane Austen _had_ poisoned me. Perhaps what I really need was a kind, simple fellow—a Bingley—rather than the one who incensed me to passion or anger by turns like Mr. Darcy had Elizabeth.

I didn't want to think any longer. "Have you been here all evening? I didn't see you arrived."

She nodded, "Yes, well, my chaperone put us a bit late arriving because she couldn't find her shawl, but I've been here. Was it awful, by the way?"

"I've not seen your chaperon or her shawl," I offered lamely.

"The _mummy_, Astrid. It looks ghastly."

"Not really as ghastly as using it for entertainment." I said under my breath, eliciting a snort from Ruffnut.

"Well, when you're mistress of this place, you can insist on croquet or lawn bowling—something less sinister."

I didn't want to insist in anything as mistress of this house. I tried to wrest the subject away once more.

"Where is your chaperone now?" I asked.

She glanced around, "Talking to your father."

I looked and saw Hilda Orvar, a stylish widow, bending Father's ear. He listened politely, but I could see by his expression that his mind was elsewhere.

"And yours?" Ruffnut asked me.

"Napping inside, perhaps," I said.

Father abhorred the practice of hiring chaperones to arrange matched and generally keeping girls like Ruffnut and me in check. But Mother—and custom—dictated I have one. Father managed to persuade her that his ancient aunt Sigurd, would be just the person. Aunt wouldn't do much to secure a match, but she also hadn't gotten in the way of my studies. Mother had worried that a less vivacious chaperone might place me at some disadvantage, but Father teased that his money and title were enough to draw interest.

I just hadn't counted on them drawing interest so quickly.

"Lucky," Ruffnutsaid, shaking her head lightly. "Oh, Astrid, I envy you."

"Well, she's _still_ a chaperone," I said. "I'm supposed to drag her around with me during the day and, by Thor, she moves slowly."

"It isn't only that your chaperone is so easy to evade," Ruffnut interrupted. "You _belong_ here. I feel utterly out of place in all this." She cast her eyes on her new dress—a perfectly nice frock of yellow silk—and waved her glass of sherry toward the crowd.

"I assure you I don't fit at all," I said. "And you look ravishing, by the way."

She smiled, "As ravishing as I can when I weigh a stone under what I ought. Mother swears she'll have me eating nothing but honey and goose fat if I don't have my court dress filled out by next week's fitting."

"She's mad," I said. "You're perfect."

"I'm far from that, but I'll do fine. Still, I'm glad you'll be clearing off so soon. The rest of us will have a hard time finding husbands until the men are all convinced you're spoken for."

"Really, Ruffnut—"

"Stop being modest. It merely adds to your already lengthy list of things I wish I were." She shook her head gently, the smiled on her face shifting a little.

"I feel about as natural here as a pig in a church."

"Well it doesn't show. And I've never seen so many men staring at a pig." She nodded to the guests.

I was having difficulty breathing.

"At least there's one eligible young man who doesn't fancy you," she added, nodding towards the mummy, where Audun presided over the extraction of a small figurine from the body, something looking like flesh now peeking from the wrappings at the feet.

"He's my brother," I said. "Though I can't imagine anyone fancying _him_." I huddled close to Ruffnut to share Audun's latest misadventure, one involving a goat and a statue in Covent Garden. "Did you hear—" I beagi, but stopped when I saw her expression.

She was looking at me wide-eyed, expectant, but more than that, a little caught out. "Oh," Was all I managed.

Ruffnut nodded, this time her cheeks growing pink. "Mother's convinced he's good match for me. Lady Orvar is working toward it already."

"Oh," I repeated. Ruffnut was a lovely girl. Smart, and genuine and kind with a little crazy on the side.

But I knew the rules, and imagination rarely entered into things, Ruffnut's father was a successful merchant and manufacturer, and though they had money, they had no title. Father had lands and title and seat in the House of Lords, all making Audun something of th best-case scenario for someone like Ruffnut.

"He's a decent sort of man," she said, though I could tell she was fishing for reassurance.

I hesitated. "He is," I said carefully. "Mother always says he possesses enough of my father's good attributes to make her hopeful. She seems to think he needs only the right sort of woman to refine those qualities.

Mrs. Orvar appeared suddenly at our sides. "Miss Hofferson, always stealing the show, aren't we?"

"I've done nothing like," I said to the woman, whose husband's death had left her with just enough to be independent, but not enough to live in style.

"Come along, Ruffnut," she ordered. "I've arranged for you to take a turn next at the body."

"Mrs. Orvar is only nervous because next to you, I make a poor comparison," Ruffnut said with mock sincerity. "She knows that next to a corpse I shall fare much better."

"Stop it, Ruffnut!" I pleaded, but Mrs. Orvar whisked her away, her shawl a storm cloud of gray silk.

Before anyone else could waylay me with gossip or questions about my dress, I headed into the gardens.

A waiter—not one I recognized—intercepted me as I sought refuge in the cooler region of the shrubbery, far from the party.

"Champagne, miss?" he asked, eyeing my chest and bodice in a manner I'd have thought bold in one above his station, much less a servant borrowed from another household to cover the party. They must have scrambled to find him, as his coat sleeves were shamefully short, even for a servant. I waved him off and continued walking.

A few minutes' stroll brought me to the center of the gardens. I leaned against another of Jorgenson's acquisitions. In the moonlight, it looked like little more than the stump of a large, squarrish tree. But the granite surface was dimpled with carvings, all radiating the remains of the sun's heat. More hieroglyphics, as unintelligible as the scroll they'd pored over back at the party. The granite pedestal now sported a mirrored gazing ball.

In the borrowed light, I studied my own reflection. I saw a version of my mother, the arched brow vaulting over each blue eye, the button nose I thought a little small for me, but elegant on her. Even my mouth was hers, the upper lips somehow off balance with the lower, a perpetual pout. Only my hair was different: Mother's was fine and auburn, mine is as gold as the sun's blonde, a handful of my curls already springing free from the tight braid circlet Clarisse had pinned there a few hours ago.

I did look the part. And in a sense Ruffnut was right. It was might birthright to marry well and fall easily into the life my mother had lived before me that she'd been planning for me since the cradle.

Would it be with Jorgenson?

Was the unrest stirring in my belly now a product of my nerves at so imminent and likely a match? Or was it the first fluttering of something more like affection?

Did it matter?

I traced the reflection of an oak behind me in the orb's shining surface. Its limbs were elongated by the curve of the ball. I ran my finger down the straight trunk as it sank into the ground.

Finding no answer to my question, or fearing the answer I might settle on. I resolved to return to the party and hoped Mother hadn't noticed my absence. But as I pushed off the pedestal, I caught movement.

Before I had a chance to decide it was just a bird or a squirrel skulking in the brush, I caught the unmistakable reflection of someone in a red frock stepping quietly from the oak's shadow to crouch behind an overgrown hydrangea in full blossom.

I froze. Terror born of the realization that I was not alone, had not been for some time, overrode every thought. And then my mind began to race, keeping time with my pounding heart. The coat was the uniform of the serving staff. I realized that it was likely that very waiter who'd eyed me so lasciviously as I fled the party.

Why had I wandered do far?

The music from the party would surely drown my scream. I'd only succeed in signaling this man that I was aware of his presence, possibly forcing him to act more rashly and quickly that he already intended.

And if I turned around and ran back to the party, he would easily intercept me.

Which left me only one option.

* * *

><p><strong>AN:** Okay, I know the Rosetta Stone is found by the British and its currently in the British Museum and it was Napoleon who they defeated….but yeah…changed it a little. And I don't about you lot, but I find Ruffnut really pretty. I want to update right away, but I'm sick…stupid flu.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note:** Sorry for the delay, I was supposed to update but our net connection sucks and we don't have connection during the day. But I woke up 3am so I decided to check if we have Internet—and we have! So I updated quickly.

**Disclaimer: ** I don't own anything.

* * *

><p><strong>Vefja<strong>

**Chapter 4**

Long before Jorgenson had come to Berk and made the Park his home, I'd spent hours straying from my own gardens through gaps in the hedgerows to those of our neighbors. I'd explored the wilds of these gardens, dodging the torments of a governess or my brothers If I could get far enough away from my pursuer, I was sure I could disappear into the tangle neared the river.

But I'd have no chance to hide if I couldn't convince my pursuer that I wasn't fleeing from him. So instead of sprinting away, I let my hand linger on the warm glass of the ball, and then walked past it, farther into the garden.

I placed each footfall deliberately, slowly, my beaded slippers crunching politely on the groomed pathway as I fought the urge to look behind me. Around the first bend in the path, I stepped casually onto the mossy shoulder. Faintly behind me, I heard the carefully placement of boots as their wearer tried vainly to step without dislodging the loose gravel.

As I rounded another twist in the path, I sidestepped from the shoulder, picked my over a bed of ferns, and ducked behind a boulder so massive that the gardeners had been forced to landscaped around it. Moments later I saw the waiter slipping from the tree to tree on the opposite side of the path. He was indeed the man who'd eyed me see boldly.

I let thirty feel or so unspool between us before even allowing myself to breathe. When he disappeared around a bend in the path, heading for the river, I realized I was shaking. I began to move again, angling back toward the path and the pillar where I'd first discovered him, trying to slow the racing of my heart. Once within sight of the party, and back on the main pathway, I allowed myself to glance back. The moonlight shone full on the groomed landscape, no trace of the man anywhere.

I paused at the hedge and peered through the lattice of leaves. The other guests were still clustered around the mummy. I patted my hair; winced as I flicked away a thorn embedded in my arm, and smoothed the front of my dress. The greater problem of what and whom to tell my misadventure in the garden remained. Mother would be embarrassed enough I slipped away unchaperoned, and the notion of a strange man following me in the bargain might be more than she could bear. And Father would certainly gather men to the waiter, to make him explain himself. I imagined the scene that might result, the shadow that would descend the party, and it would be my entire fault. Even worse, I'd once again be the center of the unwanted attention.

On top of it all, it was _possible _that the man in the red coat wasn't even following me, had meant me no ill; maybe was simply going into the garden to meet a serving girl. Audun would certainly chastise me for my wild imagination. And if Jorgenson caught wind of one of his staff shirking duty, then he'd have even more reason to speak to me.

But for all the good reasons I gave myself not to tell someone, my nerves would not quiet themselves, I would Father, but in the morning.

As I drew closer to the fire-lit circle, I realized that people were gathered not around the mummy, but rather Jorgenson.

Mother intercepted me as she saw me approach. The edge of her gown bore a silk brocade featuring—of all things—the silhouettes of tiny Egyptian figures, their angular bodies perched on straight-backed thrones, pointing flattened hands from the ends of arms bends in impossible directions. Her hair, shot through the temples with the faintest ribbon of silver, remained as expertly arranged as Clarrise had left it, her matching golden circle halo. I brushed my skirts and pretended to see the wrinkle or spot my mother had surely already observed.

"We've _discussed_ this behavior," she whispered as she eyed my dress before taking my arm away. "Skulking away…where is the book?"

"Book? I wasn't reading, Mother! I just went for a short walk—"

"Whatever you're doing, you're neglecting your duty."

"What's happening?" I asked, noticing that they music had ceased.

"Something is wrong," she said. "Jorgenson has just returned. Come!" She dragged me by hand toward the crowd.

"I'm sorry I cannot tell you more," Jorgenson was saying as he tugged his cravat. " But I just received word that this particular mummy is a_ very_ important find."

Thrilled gasps rippled out from the partygoers as they surged closer to the body. The leathery skin of the mummy's stomach now peeked through the linen wrappings, and one eye peered out emptily at the sky. Despite the warm summer air, the flesh of my bare arms prickled.

"The specimen my colleagues at the Norwegian Museum received this afternoon was the one that was to have been delivered here. There has been a terrible confusion."

I searched the crowd for the waiter in the garden. He was not among the faces that gathered around the table. Jorgenson allowed us all moment to enjoy our proximity to so valuable artifact. "As you all are no doubt aware, I take my patronage of the Norwegian Museum as both a patriotic and a scientific duty, and it grives me that we may have disturbed a mummy that bears so much—he paused here, to scan our faces and smile weakly—_significance"_.

I looked around the crowd of friends and neighbors some of whom were speculating that a pharaoh could be in their midst. What could be more significant than that? But still they stared in amazement at out host, and I wondered if they might look at me with the same eager fascination that they bestowed in Jorgenson if he indeed offered me. But that though was cut short when I caught sight of a flash of red and the profile of the very waiter who'd been following me. My heart quickened anew as I watched him slip around the front of the house. I turned back quickly and willed Jorgenson to finish so that I might convince Father to take us home.

But Jorgenson loved little more than an audience. As he went on, I noticed his valet, Gustav, staring toward the corner of the house where my pursuer had just disappeared. He kept his eyes fixed on that spot as he stepped quietly from his master's side and stalked away.

"So if you will all be so kind as to return any discoveries you may found in the wrappings to the table, I'll have them delivered to the museum with haste, I'm terribly sorry, and I assure you we will have a second gathering with a more appropriate specimen later this summer."

Sir Einar Gerhardsen—who was reliably drunk hours before anyone ever caught up to him at parties—applauded awkwardly at Jorgenson's speech. But Lord Jorgenson didn't look the party he usually played. He glanced around nervously, then asked with absolute agitation in his voice, "Where on earth is that whelp who was meant to be cataloging these things?"

"I'm here, sir," came a voice from below the table on the opposite side. He rose, a pile of linen folded as carefully as he could manage in his hands. "The linen, sir," he began, "we use it to verify locations and cond—"

"I know what you use it for," Jorgenson snapped. "Make yourself useful and scurry on back to the museum to prepare—"

"But Lord Jorgenson, procedure…you see…science even…dictates that—"

"I've given instructions simple enough for even you to follow," Jorgenson said. "Do not embarrass yourself further in front your betters."

They boy's face fell as the linen spilled from his hands. He turned, retrieved his ledger, and began his retreat from the garden.

I was shocked at this manifestation of Jorgenson's temper. Without thinking, I whispered under my breath. _"I'' est une brute."_

Jorgenson looked up and fixed a bemused smile on me. "He is a rough beast of a thing, is he not?"

Now I found myself surprised at both at the strength of his hearing and his facility with French. The young man paused, turned, and looked even more humiliated than he had before. I opened my mouth, desperate to explain myself, eager to make sure the kind-face emerald eyed young man understood that my insult had been directed at Jorgenson's treatment of him, but he disappeared before I had a chance to speak.

Jorgenson had already forgotten him as he addressed us once again. "I'm most disappointed that our evening must end prematurely. I've sent my footman round to gather your coachmen and ready the carriages." He sounded once again like himself, but there was something else there behind the swagger.

_Fear._

I'd never seen the man nervous before. Even when he first made my father's acquaintance (Father inspired many men to new depths of seflf-doubt, so quiet and confident was he), he seemed as sure of himself as he did when relaying the history of some urn on his mantel. Now I recognized an apprehension that was almost startling. The crowd around him began to disperse, some coming forward to return just-acquired trinkets back to the mummy, the others scattering for hats and shawls.

Jorgenson caught me studying him. I straightened, sudden nervous yet the same time irritated at him. Guests flowed past, offering hands and thanks, but our host seemed to have eyes for me only as he wove his way through the crowd to stand before me.

"A most exciting evening, sir," I managed to force out.

He nodded gravely, "Though not for the reason I'd anticipated," he admitted. "I was so looking forward to this evening to celebrating of your debut. I had it all planned perfectly…"

Planned? Was he trying to tell me he'd arranged the party for me? That he knew Mother would accept the invitation? And how, I wondered, was the process of disturbing the careful preserved remains of a thousand-year-old pharaoh the perfect way to commemorate my introductions to offer for me? If a courtship began this way, I could not imagine what we might do to celebrate my engagement—not that I want to be engage with him.

I smiled and said, "But how fortunate the error was discovered before the remains had been compromised."

"Yes, I think we were in time." He reached down and took my hand, giving it a light pat as if it settled the entire matter. I looked around to see if anyone else has caught the gesture. Mother was beaming at me from a few feet away and it took all my will to keep from snatching my hand from his grasp.

"Thank you, Lord Jorgenson, I'm sure all residents of the Park will look forward to—" But I was interrupted by a scream piercing the air.

Jorgenson dropped my hand—thank Thor—and ran for the front of the house. I followed him through the open gardens, through the ballroom, the great hall and the foyer to the front drive where the carriages stood waiting. A knot of partygoers buzzed about a small black coach with a door hanging open, horses idle in the traces.

"He's dead!" I heard the voice of Dr. Gothi call out.

The crowd launched forward a fresh round of gasps into the air. Husbands and fathers clutched wives and daughters gallantly and Jorgenson tossed me a look that made me wonder of he intend to go all in then and there and draw me to him. I looked away, eager to dismiss his attention and slipped closer toward the body.

It wasn't merely retreat from his affection that pushed me away from Jorgenson. I had never seen a dead body before—at least not presumably so freshly dead.

"It's the mummy's curse," I heard more than one voice whisper.

The man's body looked to have fallen from the carriage; one leg still dangled from the step below the door. I could see no mark upon him. No wound or cut or spot of blood to match the scarlet serving coat he wore. But his head seem to be turned a bit too far to the left. It appeared unlikely that he was meant to be in that carriage at all. And unlikely now that I'd ever know for certain who had been stalking me in the garden. Because the corpse that lay before us now was the very man I'd fled not a quarter of an hour ago.

* * *

><p><strong>AN:** A mummy's curse? What? Seriously? Stay tuned! Review!


	5. Chapter 5

**Author's Note:** Downtown Abbey vibe, huh? Hail to the people who watched Downtown Abbey!

**Disclaimer:** I don't own anything.

* * *

><p><strong>Vefja<strong>

**Chapter 5**

Audun collapsed into his chair at breakfast, reaching for his cup, complaining that the tea had gone cold before he even touched the pot. My brother might have been easier to love of he appreciated how ridiculously advantageous his life was, if he had the good grace to be a _little_ humble. I wondered if any girl—Ruffnut included—could inspire him in this direction.

"Some excitement last night, Asttie?" he asked, using the pet name given by my other brother, Agmund. Agmund was at sea, a lieutenant on a sixty-four gunner. I loved to hear him call me Asttie, but from Audun's mouth it sounded as insulting as he no doubt meant to.

"Quite," I said after sipping from my own cup, trying to mask my own curiosity. Upon returning home last night, I knew I should have been upset by the evening's events. Mother had been so agitated that Father closed her with a drop of laudanum and sent her to bed. But a dozen drops from Mother's small amber vial wouldn't have made me even drowsy. Before falling asleep, I resolved to tell Father my tale at the first opportunity, but when I awoke just after at dawn hurried downstairs after dressing, I learned from Mrs. Solberg, our housekeeper, that Father had risen earlier and ridden into town on urgent business.

So I would wait. Father would know what to do, who to tell about what I'd seen, or if it even might be of importance. He might have been handed his title and place in the House of Lords by an accident of birth, but if any man could it earn it, I'd no doubt it would have been him. His intelligence and integrity were the favorite topic of my friends' parents when Father's not around.

The door from the front hall opened as Mrs. Solberg glided into the room. Her long gray summer dress was starched stiff, pleats in the sleeves that would have wilted by midday in the summer heat on anyone but her. She stared proudly over our heads at the portrait of my grandfather as she announced, "Lord Jorgenson to see you, Miss Hofferson."

"So early?" I muttered, tossing my napkin to the table and rising from my chair.

"Come to see if you're alright, I'd wager," my brother said.

"Or perhaps he has no tea and toast at home."

Audun looked positively confused. "Of course he has tea and toast. He has twenty thousand pounds a year, you git."

Audun's obssesion with the wealth of others was not among his better qualities. He'd memorized the incomes and asset of virtually every one of his peers in Berk society. It was the closest he came to any true talent.

I glared at him, noticing for the first time the outlandish neck scarf he wore. The print looked almost like animal skin—or maybe peacock feathers. Audun's attire was usually carefully thought of to avoid drawing attention to anything except how expensively tailored his jackets were. Bright colors and patterns, he once told me, stole the eye away from the invisible seams and perfect lines.

"What on earth is that?" I asked, nodding at the garish addition.

He looked down at his chest, and then back at me, his cheeks tingeing pink.

"Just…something. That is—"

He was saved further explanation by Jorgenson's entrance. Audun also rose to his seat. Jorgenson still wore last night's suit, and the expression to match. He crossed the room to the table, bowed like a duck diving underwater, and motioned for me to sit down.

"Miss Hofferson," he said, nodding. "Audun," he said, turning to my brother.

"Will you sit, sir?" I asked.

"Thank you," he said, folding himself into Mother's chair.

"Will you take tea?"

He nodded again, then reached for the teapot and my mother's waiting cup. "Are you quite recovered?" he asked as he poured, dropped to lumps of sugar, and tipped the milk pitcher slightly into the steaming liquid.

"From last night? I assure you I've almost completely forgotten it." I lied.

He gulped at the tea. "Very well. It is easy for the ladies to move on, is it not, Audun?"

Audun nodded knowingly. "Certainly. They are accustomed to allowing the stronger sex to handle matters, and this is a matter far too indelicate for women to bear."

Only my brother could make concern sound so insulting. I resisted the urge to fling the toast platter at his head. It would have been empty at any rate, as Jorgenson had removed the last two slices and was slathering butter and preserves across with my knife. I raised an eyebrow at Audun.

"Make yourself at ease, Lord Jorgenson," I said, adding, "I'm sure your night was even longer and more exhausting than ours was."

He nodded his head. Between sips of tea, he told us that the dead man bore no identification. No other household claimed him as an employee, though several of the staff had seen him serving at the party and assumed he was simply one of the many members if neighboring households loaned out to Jorgenson's for the evening. And more than once he made mention of the pall it might cast on his household, his good name even, to have a murdered stranger tumbling from a coach on one's drive.

It was ridiculous that anyone would associate the death with Lord Jorgenson or his household, but gossip would link his name with the unidentified dead man for a few weeks at least.

"It would be forgotten in a fortnight." I consoled him.

"Yes, but now with the other attacks—"

"Other attacks?" my brother asked as the hairs on my neck bristled.

Jorgenson gulped down a bite. "You haven't heard, then?"

Now I grew impatient. "Please enlighten us."

"I thought it would be the talk of Berk by now," he said. "Early this morning, two more of my guests from the party were attacked!"

My hand rose to my mouth. "You don't mean—"

"Murdered?" Audun offered.

Jorgenson shook his head vigorously. "Heavens, no! I meant to say their homes had been attacked! Lady Ack awoke to find the bureau and closets of her dressing rooms ransacked.

"Ransacked!" I repeated, feigning to be the shocked girl, I am not.

"Yes, and a choice of jewel or two missing from the chest."

"Is she alright?"

"Better than Mr. Ingerman," he said solemnly.

"Not poor Ingerman," I whispered. Brundtland was solicitor to my father and half of this side of Berk. He loved A Lady's novels almost as much as I did, though I suspected I was the only one who knew it. Not to mention, his son, Fishlegs, is one my dear friends aside from Ruffnut and her twin brother, Tuffnut.

"He's not dead either, but he has a nasty headache. Seems last night he heard a nose in the parlor, went downstairs to investigate, and that was that. Awoke with a knot the size of an apple on his temple.

"How about Fishlegs, is he okay?" I inquired.

"He's fine…he slept on the other side of the house, but he was shocked to find his father unconscious early in the morning."

"Anything taken?" Audun asked.

"Not that they can see, but he's uncertain that his memory is as reliable as it should be owing to the forced of the blow."

"Oh dear," I said, relaxing back in my chair. "Terrible luck for our neighbors."

"But already people are saying it's more than that. Servants are whispering, vendors are talking, I have it on good authority that the evening newspapers will lead with the story," Jorgenson said as he licked jam from his thumb. I can't help but frown at that gesture.

"A slow news day indeed if a pair of simple burglaries takes precedence over news of the war—" I began, before he interrupted.

"But they've blown it all up unto something else entirely, of course. One man murdered, and two homes vandalized suddenly becomes proof a mummy's course! The Curse of the Auðigr Park Mummy, they're calling it!"

"Nonsense!" I said, leaning forward in my chair. "The paper can say anything it wants, it's simple bad, coincidental luck, isn't it?"

Jorgenson hesistated, scanning the table for more food. On finding he'd cleared it, he reached for the teapot and poured another cup. "Certainly…I suppose…."

I was stunned that one who'd invested a fortune in Egypt and its treasures had not developed a thicker skin on this point.

"Do you mean to say there is something to this?"

Sensing my disbelief, he backed away. "No, but the power of these stories and rumors of happenings with other mummies and tombs and so forth…they can stoke the imagination in a powerful way."

"Certainly—but those are myths, are they not? Is there any validity to them?" The pharaohs were merely kinds who got salted and wrapped after they died. They weren't superhuman. They couldn't curse us from beyond the grave, could they?

"I've never experienced any of it firsthand," he said carefully, "but there had been many reports of strange doings associated with the opening of the tombs, or the removal of artifacts…"

A chill seized me. "What kind of strange doings?"

He swallowed hard. "Unpleasant things…things far too upsetting to worry you about, much less discuss over breakfast.

I'd heard snatches of tales where people involved in digs or removal of artifacts met calamitous circumstances shortly after. But those were over in Egypt when the items were removed….this was _Norway._

"Could it be true?" I asked. "You said yourself that the mummy was an important one—"

Jorgenson held up a hand. "I've said too much already, and upset you in bargain," he began, "We must leave the topic at once. Here I came to make sure you were alright, and I've only upset you even more. Pray, do not think of this any longer." He bit his thumb. "I do not hope these events don't cast a pall over the remainder of the season's parties."

"No," I said, but I was still thinking about the possibility of the curses.

He looked at me anew, his expression softening. "You're a great comfort to me," he said, his gaze lingering a second longer than was proper before realizing Audun was still at the table with us. "And you as well, Audun. Steady heads, the both of you. I'm greatful for your friendship."

"Not at all." Audun said.

"We are glad to be of any help." I forced to say. Jorgenson smiled. The silence lasted just long enough to foretell he had more to say.

"Miss Hofferson," he began at last, "I noticed how very curious you were about the specimen from last night's unwrapping, and I was wondering—"

He paused, looked at my brother, and smiled sheepishly. Audun reached for his cup, shrugging.

"I was hoping, rather," Jorgenson went on, "that you might allow me to escort you to the museum one morning. I'm sure the curator would be most willing to offer us a private tour, and I'd very much like to afford you an opportunity to have your questions handled by one so peerless on his knowledge, Mr. Gunnar."

I froze. Last night's performance was more than a celebration of my debut, then. Ruffnut has been right. Mother had been right. Jorgenson was making overtures to court me. I found the confirmation of this to be nauseating.

"I—"

His words came in a tumble. "You'd probably think me brash for inviting you under such a cloud as the one that has settled on our street, but I confess that I'm afraid that if I do not move swiftly, I may not have another opportunity."

Now my head is positively aching. Jorgenson, it appeared, was in even more of a hurry that Mother.

"She'll have to speak with Mother," Audun broke in. I was grateful for his intrusion, grateful that it gave me a moment to think.

Jorgenson turned toward him. "Of course. I would expect nothing less and we would bring her along, or some other suitable chaperone. You, perhaps?" He asked Audun.

Audun snorted. "No, thank you. I'm afraid the museum bores me. Dreadfull stuff."

"Your aunt, then?" Jorgenson returned to me. His smile was wager, his words kinds. It was all as simple and as easy as I could have hoped for. Put on a lovely dress, go to a party, and catch a man. I should be delighted, but I couldn't help feeling as if it had bee all too easy, too pat. As if I'd been robbed of the opportunity to struggled for a match, for love, as a character in a novel might. This is not what I want; he is not who I wanted.

"I will speak with Mother." I managed to say.

He nodded, satisfied, and stood." Well, I'm sure your day bound to be as busy as my own."

Jorgenson had a day of meeting with inspectors from Berk Police Service or with museum officials to look forward to. I anticipated little more than calling on Ruffnut to see if she might have heard something more, or perhaps even enduring a visit with the Stoltenberg, as they always could be relied on for the choicest gossip.

Jorgenson paused at the door. "By the way, are you both certain that all the items removed from the wrappings last night were returned to the table?"

I felt the heat rise through my chest and neck; the tips of my ears seemed to glow like a coal drawn from the grate. My brother—always eager to take charge in situations he knew nothing about—provided a welcome distraction. "Positive. I was at the table the entire time, even when you were called away by your manservant. All four of the items found were back on the table at the end of the evening when we left the body."

"You're certain?" Jorgenson asked.

"Yes," my brother said.

"Astrid?" he asked me.

I thought of the little dog's head hidden in the black velvet hatbox that I kept in the bottom of my wardrobe. I'd put it there the moment I'd returned from the party. I knew I should retrieve it, but again, Jorgenson's attentions muddled things. How embarrassing now to own my deviance, in front of Audun no less, and on the heels of Jorgenson inviting me on an outing. Not that I paid much heed for his attention but how disastrous it would be for both Mother and Father if he discovered too early in _our courtship_ my imperfections, my attachment to silly objects.

My independence.

And what of the curse? What if it were true? If an evil had visited people who'd merely attended the party, what might it mean for a girl who was so foolish as to keep something from the body?

I thought quickly. It would be much better if I returned it later, when things had calmed down. Or if I managed to leave it secretly behind in the museum when Jorgenson escorted me there.

I sighed and spoke. "You said yourself, we women have no head for these things. I confess, I was lost in the excitement of the unwrapping and paid no attention. Why?"

He eyed me with—what? Suspicion, perhaps? He stopped, shook his head.

"Don't trouble yourself any more with this, Miss Hofferson," he said smiling. "Promise me you'll go read one of those books you like so much, take your mind off unpleasantness."

I curtsied and thanked him for the suggestion. He nodded at Audun and ducked out the door. But reading was the last thing I wanted to do. I had so many questions, so many possibilities, that I felt a story was unfolding around me at this moment.

* * *

><p><strong>AN:** Whoo…it's a mummy's curse then? I wonder what will Astrid decision about the jackal's head? And the most important question is…where is Hiccup!? Reviews!


End file.
